n being perhaps better. He stayed
only to tear this down, and proceeded to the other landing, where the
same insult confronted him.

Who the author might be he was free to guess.

As he lay awake that night, tossing and turning, he racked his brain to
devise some retribution.

And yet, his more sensible self told him, hadn't he been leading up to
this all the term? What had he done to make the fellows respect, much
more like, him? He had bullied, and swaggered, and set himself against
the good of the School. The fellows who followed him only did so in the
hope of getting something--either fun or advantage--out of the
agitation. They didn't care twopence about Clapperton, and were ready
enough to drop him as soon as ever it suited their turn. The one or two
things he could do well, and for which anybody respected him--as, for
instance, football--he had deliberately shut himself off from, leaving
his authority to depend only on the very qualities he had least cause to
be proud of.

It was easy enough to say that Brinkman and Dangle cut even a poorer
figure over this wretched business than he. But who troubled their
heads about Brinkman and Dangle? The former had already been snuffed
out hopelessly, and dared not show his face. Dangle, as everybody knew,
had a personal grudge against Rollitt, and was unhampered by scruples as
to how he scored. But he--Clapperton--he had always tried to pose as a
decent sort of fellow, with some kind of interest in the good of the
School and some sort of notion about common honour and decency. Ugh!
this was what had come of it! As he lay awake that night, the sound of
the laughter round the notice boards and the "Ain't you glad?" of the
juniors dinned in his ears, sometimes infuriating, sometimes humiliating
him; but in either case mockingly reminding him that Clapperton's
greatest enemy in Fellsgarth was the captain of the Modern side.

Next morning brought no news of the missing boy, and a vague feeling of
anxiety spread through the School. Boys remembered how proud and
sensitive Rollitt had been, and how dreadful was the accusation against
him. Suppose he had done something desperate? He had cared little
enough for danger when all went well. Would he be likely to care more,
now that the School was in league against him, pointing to him as a
thief, and hounding him out of its society?

All sorts of dreadful possibilities occurred both to masters and boys;
and all th